Legal and Policy Advancements for Advanced Reactors
Draft legislation American Nuclear Infrastructure Act of 2020 set to provide further support for advanced reactors
On July 29th, Senator Barrasso (R-WY) introduced a draft bill, the American Nuclear Infrastructure Act of 2020 (ANIA), which, aims to re-establish U.S. international competitiveness and global leadership in nuclear power. Among other things, the draft bill would—
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On July 23, 2020, the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation (DCF) announced its intention to open the door to funding opportunities for nuclear projects abroad.
In a summary of its decision following a voluntary 30-day comment period, DCF announced that it has enabled “its full suite of finance products to support all civil nuclear projects…
Advanced nuclear reactors promising smaller, simpler, and safer nuclear energy are moving closer and closer to commercial reality. As we recently blogged, Oklo Inc., a California-based company, recently submitted the nation’s first application to construct and operate a non-light water advanced reactor. In response to this trend, the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is exploring…
The United States has been struggling to compete with its peers in securing nuclear power plant construction projects around the world. One of the factors impacting U.S. competitiveness is that many foreign countries such as Russia and China can obtain government financing to support foreign projects—whereas U.S. vendors cannot. Under a recent proposal, this imbalance…
The latter half of May has seen regulatory initiatives benefiting advanced reactors promoted across the government. The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) affirmed new guidance on non-light water reactor (non-LWR) methodologies, and the Department of Energy (DOE) showed support for a new, streamlined emergency preparedness framework for small modular reactors (SMRs) and new reactor technologies. …
Yesterday the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) published its proposed rule to revise its Emergency Preparedness (EP) requirements for small modular reactors (SMRs) and other new technologies (ONT, such as advanced reactors). Comments for the proposed rule and accompanying guidance are due on July 27, 2020.
These amendments have been a long time coming,…
Over the past month, there have been major developments related to U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) advanced reactor licensing reform and nuclear-related export controls.
Kicking Off New Advanced Reactor Rulemaking
On April 13 the NRC staff published a paper (SECY-20-0032) seeking Commission approval for a rulemaking approach that would create a voluntary framework…
Even in these extremely challenging times, advanced reactor innovators are working hard to make the next generation of clean, safe nuclear reactors a reality. To this end, Oklo Inc. (Oklo) recently applied to the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) for a combined license to construct and operate a non-light water advanced reactor, the “Aurora,” to…
The Energy Impact Center (EIC), which brought us the well-known Titans of Nuclear podcast series, has recently launched “OPEN100,” which provides important open-source information intended to streamline the power plant design and licensing process with an emphasis on simplifying design, reducing construction costs and timelines, and increasing price certainty.
Launched on February 25,…
Since 2016, the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has been developing a strategy to review future non-light water reactor (non-LWR) technologies. That year, the NRC published the NRC Vision and Strategy: Safely Achieving Effective and Efficient Non-Light Water Reactor Mission Readiness, which laid out objectives to achieve review and regulation of non-LWRs. Afterward,…
